This invention relates to an apparatus for rotating at least one flat object. Such an apparatus is known from French patent application 2,315,131 in which an apparatus is described for turning over cards with a magnetic strip which have been inserted the other way around into an automatic machine or the like.
This apparatus has a rotor with a pair of transport rollers which define a nip for transporting and retaining a card. When the rotor is in a receiving and feeding position, a feed path extending along a sensor extends into the rotor and between the two transport rollers. A card inserted into the apparatus passes along the sensor into the area between the two transport rollers.
For driving the two transport rollers, there is provided a driving gear wheel capable of driving the transport rollers by way of transmission gear wheels and a first transmission roller. From the driving gear wheel, also a second transmission roller is driven, located on the opposite side of the rotor. The first transmission roller and the second transmission roller are suspended in a carrier with two arms which are pivotable about a common axis parallel to and spaced from the rotation axis of the rotor and are coupled to each other through a spring and a stop. The arm carrying the first transmission roller further comprises an indexing pawl which can engage in indexing recesses of the rotor for retaining the rotor in two receiving and feeding positions.
When the rotor is in any of the two receiving and feeding positions, the indexing pawl engages in one of two indexing recesses of the rotor and the first transmission roller is in engagement with a roller which is suspended coaxially and non-rotatably relative to one of the transport rollers, so that the transport rollers are driven.
If it is desired to turn the card, an electromagnet pulls towards itself the arm which carries the indexing pawl, so that the indexing pawl engaging in the indexing recess of the rotor is pulled from that indexing recess. As a result, also the first transmission roller is moved away from the roller coupled to the transport rollers, so that the drive of the transport rollers stops.
The other arm of the carrier, connected to this arm via a spring, then moves along. As a result, the second transmission roller engages a roller which is coaxial relative to the axis about which the rotor is rotatable. The rotor is thereby driven and so caused to rotate.
Shortly after the rotor has started to rotate, the electromagnet is deactivated again, so that the indexing pawl comes to lie against the outer circumference of the track in which the indexing recesses have been provided. The rotation of the rotor is subsequently stopped when the indexing pawl falls into the opposite one of the two indexing recesses. The arm carrying the first transmission roller thereby moves to its initial position again, so that the drive of the transport rollers is resumed again. The other arm then also moves back to its initial position, so that the second transmission roller's engagement of the roller coaxial with the rotor ends again.
A drawback of this apparatus is that it is not very suitable for processing heavier objects nor for achieving very high processing speeds. Objects easily slip too far, or fall from the rotor or are slung from the rotor during rotation thereof.